Monday, July 03, 2006

The Motley Garb - A Fool's Fashion

A few thoughts on fashion, personal style, and vocation...

Once one leaves high school (or perhaps the cliques of college), there just aren't many people willing to tell you what fashion is best suited for you. (Barring, of course, GQ, Cosmo, Mr. Blackstone, Ms. Rivers, those four clowns/slanderers on Bravo, and the entire staff of the Style network.) Even moreso for those of us in the more specialized, rarified public vocations.

Ever the fool, I feel called to do my part to help.
Of course, before we start, I should probably make a few things clear.

What qualifies me to give fashion advice to you?
Not a thing. Zip. Nada. The sum total of what I don't know about fashion could stun an ox. (I love that line-- always good when I can slip it into conversations.)
That being said, I know what I like. I do have a sense of style. Sure its a strange sense, perhaps even a misguided sense-- but it is consistent. My style choices are made based on comfort, cost, costume, and character.
• Life is too short to wear things that are uncomfortable (especially shoes).
• Professional expenses do not cover wardrobe expansions (in most cases).
• Clothes are the "costume" for the role you are called to play--or the one you intend to play, anyway.
• In the end, clothes identify who you are--they denote your unique character-- or they should.
My real qualification? I'm a Fool.
Who but a fool would claim to know more about what works best for someone else, fashion-wise?

So who am I prepared to give fashion advice to?
• Anyone who asks me freely for my fashion opinons and advice (talk about foolish).
• Barring the direct question, I'm afraid I'm going to have to limit my advice to those I know something about.
Male Unitarian Universalist Ministers, 30 to 40 years old, living/serving in the midwest of the United States of America. To be truly fair about this, I should probably limit my advice to those who have come out of the Catholic and Lutheran tradtions, those that have driven cab for a living, and those who are currently overweight (though working on changing that).
Looking over my list-- checking it twice-- I find that I have narrowed the field of people I'm qualified to give fashion advice to down to just one. (That certainly simplifies things.)

My fashion advice?
• Wear hats (the more character they have, the better). Yes, in the pulpit, whenever possible.
• Wear Jeans some times-- but not the blue ones-- the black ones look dressy while still being casual for those "casual" services.
• Wear some sign of your vocation when you are actively/intentionally practicing your vocation and reppresenting your tradition. I like the chalice tie bars from CLF.
• Wear something dressier than you normally do when you are headed to church and something dressier than that when you are in the pulpit. (Please note that this is relative to your standards of style, NOT the best dressed person in the pews.)
• Wear what you want to wear-- within reason! In the end, its your style and your character-- and there is no "right" way to dress as a UU minister (or as anything else, for that matter). Sure, there are plenty of fashion wrongs, and even a few fashion "sins"; but very few of them will get you sent to hell (or increase your time there--if that's your brand of Universalism).
They will, it seems, get you mocked, chastised, and threatened with minor assaults upon your person-- but that's the price of being an individual in our society. Such has it always been.

So sayeth the man in the red, green, blue, and yellow hat with the little brass bells (curled shoes always optional).

On second thought, maybe I'll just keep my fashion advice to myself until I'm asked for it....
trusting that someone else, someone with an absolute knowledge of the fashion TRUTH will reveal it to all the less fortunate, the less stylish, the less informed.